Tavares leads Islanders past Golden Knights
NEW YORK » John Tavares kept up his scoring surge with two more goals and New York handed expansion Vegas its second loss of the season.
Andrew Ladd, Mathew Barzal, Cal Clutterbuck and Nikolay Kulemin also scored, and Jaroslav Halak stopped 31 shots to help the Islanders win for the fifth time in six games. Tavares has eight goals in the last four games.
William Karlsson, Alex Tuch and Colin Miller scored for the Golden Knights, who snapped a five-game winning streak and lost another goalie to injury. With starter MarcAndre Fleury and backup Malcolm Subban already sidelined, Oscar Dansk left after Tavares scored the tying goal late in the second period with an apparent leg injury.
Dansk, who came in 3-0 with an NHL-best 1.34 goals-against average, made 17 saves. Maxime Lagace, the fourth goalie Vegas has used in its inaugural season, came on for his NHL debut and gave up four goals on 11 shots. BLUES 4, KINGS 2 » Vladimir Tarasenko and Jaden Schwartz each had a goal and an assist to lead St. Louis past Los Angeles in a matchup between two of the NHL’s top teams.
Carl Gunnarsson scored the game-winner and Vladimir Sobotka added an empty-netter for the Blues, who improved to 102-1 to match the franchise’s best start set in 1997. Jake Allen made 26 saves as St. Louis remained the only unbeaten team on home ice this season (5-0).
Tanner Pearson and Dustin Brown scored for the Kings, who had their three-game winning streak snapped and fell to 9-2-1. Jonathan Quick made 26 saves. LIGHTNING 8, PANTHERS 5 » Andrei Vasilevskiy won his ninth straight start and Steven Stamkos scored twice to lift Tampa Bay over Florida.
Vasilevskiy made 18 saves and shares the longest win streak by a goalie in franchise history with John Grahame, who won nine in a row from Nov. 14 to Dec. 10, 2005.
Ondrej Palat scored the go-ahead goal and had an assist. Nikita Kucherov added his NHL-leading 13th goal and an assist, while Brayden Point and Yanni Gourde each had a goal and an assist for the Lightning. Vladislav Namestnikov and Anton Stralman also scored.
Aleksander Barkov had a goal and three assists to lead the Panthers. Evgeni Dadanov, Jamie McGinn, Jonathan Huberdeau and Aaron Ekblad also scored for Florida.
James Reimer allowed five goals on 19 shots before being replaced by Antti Niemi at 10:22 of the second. Niemi stopped 16 shots. BLUE JACKETS 4, BRUINS 3, SO» Artemi Panarin and Oliver Bjorkstrand scored in the shootout, and Columbus beat Boston after squandering a two-goal lead in the third period.
Columbus has won eight of its first 12 games, a franchise record for October.
Blue Jackets goalie Sergei Bobrovsky had an assist — the eighth of his career and first this season. Bobrovsky made 27 saves for his sixth win.
Tuukka Rask stopped 29 shots for the Bruins, who lost their second in a row and dropped to 4-4-2.
David Savard, Boone Jenner and Tyler Motte scored in regulation for Columbus.
Patrice Bergeron, Torey Krug and Brad Marchand had goals for the Bruins. CANADIENS 8, SENATORS 3 » Charles Hudon scored his first two NHL goals and had an assist, helping Montreal roll to a victory over Ottawa.
Artturi Lehkonen also scored twice for the Canadiens, and Shea Weber had three assists. Al Montoya stopped 25 shots in his first win of the season.
Max Pacioretty, Alex Galchenyuk, Brendan Gallagher and Tomas Plekanec scored as Montreal won back-to-back games for the first time this season.
Ottawa got goals from Tom Pyatt, Ryan Dzingel and Chris DiDomenico. Craig Anderson made just nine saves on 15 shots through two periods before being replaced by Mike Condon, who allowed two goals on 14 shots.
Senators captain Erik Karlsson, one of the NHL’s best defensemen, was on the ice for seven Montreal goals.